Getting Things Done Like Scott Magdalein

I wholeheartedly believe that if you’re going to be successful, it’s important to surround yourself with people who are where you want to be and can do things you cannot yet do. I met Scott Magdalein when I started seeing him on Twitter as the “Digerati Coxswain” for the infamous YouVersion app. Because of the success of the app, (50 million downloads and counting!) I knew he had some info to share. I was surprised to see that how he does stuff is so simple!

What’s the name of the organization you do project management for?

Scott: My company is called SumSix right now, but I’ve worked with LifeChurch.tv in the past as well as many other companies.

What’s your typical day look like?

Mostly balancing time between wireframing new app layouts, keeping contractors moving forward on projects, and strategizing new ideas to life.

What’s your method of collecting, processing and delegating tasks?

I’ve used well-defined methods in the past, but most of them breakdown for me. So now I use email and the iOS Reminders app to manage incoming obligations, delegate quickly, or move to my todo list. Within Reminders, I do a morning review and assign myself tasks for the day. Everything else stays in a tickler file of sorts.

How do you keep track of your appointments?

Calendar. Nothing special.

Are you a big fan of a particular software for getting things done?

Reminders for iOS since it works seamlessly with Siri and syncs with iCloud.

Do you have a particular success story you’re proud of?

There’s no doubt that I saw the most continuous success while at YouVersion. The team was amazing. The leadership was amazing. And it was the perfect environment to make something revolutionary, which I believe we did (and they’re still doing). When I showed up, there were two developers and one designer. YouVersion had about a million users between the iPhone and Blackberry apps and were growing pretty steadily. When I left two and a half years later, there were more than a dozen full timers on the YouVersion team, dozens of contractors, hundreds of volunteers, and more than 50 million users across 9 platforms.

What about a time where you learned something new?

I’m always learning something new. What is life but a series of lessons, one after the next? But if I singled out a specific thing, a specific time when I learned something exceptionally valuable, I’d have to say that it happened in January of this year. About a month after leaving YouVersion, I talked with Terry Storch, the guy running it. He’s a mentor of mine even still. He said it was tough having me leave, but that he’d figured out a way to fill the gap in a really positive and growth-ready way. In that one conversation I learned the value that I had brought to that team and that I could bring to other projects and products in the future. He gave me confidence. But he also brought me humility; I was replaceable to some degree. I’m not the only one in the world that can do what I do…and that’s incredibly grounding for me.